Exposing people in their 20s and 30s who have lived in rural communities most of their lives to the video is not always effective. It presents information that is new and not easily understood. Yet as future social workers, it is crucial for them to have some critical awareness of the larger social forces that affect them and the people they will serve in their careers.

Reading the notes the most recent class wrote confirmed the difficulty. So I took my own notes and included them in the Power Point for class discussion. Excerpts are below.

Consumer – Microsoft WORD Clip Art

The Century of the Self – Part 1: “Happiness Machine”

This is “the story of the relationship between Sigmund Freud and his American nephew, Edward Bernays. Bernays invented the public relations profession in the 1920s and was the first person to take Freud’s ideas to manipulate the masses. He showed American corporations how they could make people want things they didn’t need by systematically linking mass-produced goods to their unconscious desires” (YouTube overview, emphasis added).

Consider the subtitle of this first part of the documentary, “Happiness Machine” How does this relate to the overall message of this video?

The preface to the video introduces Sigmund Freud’s theory about human nature. Simply stated, Freud theorized that all people carry primitive sexual and aggressive forces hidden deep inside. If these forces are not controlled, societies will be filled with chaos and destruction.

What are your thoughts about Freud’s perspective? Our guess is that it’s easy to conclude that the theory has merit if one views society today. Now consider the same question from the perspective of your ancestral roots. Do you think Freud’s theory explains your ancestors’ motivations and your own?

The preface of the video also explains that the purpose of this series was to raise awareness about the ways in which Freud’s ideas have been used by those in positions of power “to control the dangerous crowd in an age of mass democracy.”

How does the timeframe of Bernays’ work fit with shifts in the focus of social work practice and social welfare policies? Can you see any links to your ancestors’ experiences during this historical era?

Part 1 describes the central role that Bernays played in popularizing and applying Freud’s theories to “manipulate the masses,” working both with politicians and corporations.

What are some of the ways Bernays employed theories to promote US entry into war, increase cigarette sales for tobacco corporations, or buffer corporations from overproduction when WWI ended?

Strategies for social control in times of peace followed, involving “the engineering of consent.” How was this done?

Stuart Ewen, historian and author, noted that the emergence of democracy had changed the relationship of power that governed the world. He described how Bernays’ strategies gave back power to the ruling elite by “giving people some kind of feel good medication that did not alter their objective circumstances … even if it meant stimulating the irrational self.”

The Great Depression ushered in by the 1929 stock market crash required a different approach to governing. Franklin D. Roosevelt believed people were rational and he wanted to know what they thought as he began to initiate a series of interventions to address massive social issues that affected them. He turned to George Gallup who had developed a way to poll peoples’ opinions scientifically without introducing emotional bias. It gave citizens a rational voice so they could take part in government.

With Bernays’ help, “big business” fought back with an ideological attack on the New Deal to regain power by creating emotional ties to corporations. The 1939 World Fair presented an opportunity to manipulate people to believe that democracy would not exist without capitalism and the goods it produces.

“Active citizenship” was replaced by “passive consumers.”

Consumer – Microsoft WORD Clip Art

A day after I posted the notes, I found myself face-to-face with the consequences of consumerism. My granddaughter’s birthday was coming up. She has discovered therapeutic coloring books and loves the challenge of using her new pens to create intricate patterns of many colors. For her birthday, I offered to let her choose a new coloring book. She was excited. Off we went to a “big box” store to see what we could find.

The store was filled with people browsing art supplies, plastic flowers, craft kits, and aisles of yarn. We perused all of the merchandise several times unsuccessfully. The only three staff in sight were womanning the cash registers, nonstop. There were no roaming staff to ask for help, so I asked a young girl if she had seen any coloring books.

I turned and smiled. “I didn’t think she worked here. But I thought maybe she had seen coloring books. My granddaughter and I are trying to find them and we haven’t been able to find any staff people to help.”

The woman came up to us and asked her daughter to help us look, so they both joined the search. Even with more people looking, we still had no luck.

“I know how to get their attention,” the woman finally said. She walked over to the rows of yarn and grabbed two huge balls of yarn and stood below the surveillance camera posted high on the wall. She shoved the balls into the top of her shirt and held up her arms and waved them at the camera. “This should get someone’s attention!”

She was right. A humorless dour-faced man walked through a hidden side door. “Where are the coloring books,” she shouted.

“By the cash registers,” he replied before he turned without further comment and disappeared again.

Tears from laughter were clouding my vision as we headed to see if we could find coloring books. No luck. My granddaughter was undaunted. Despite the long lines at the registers, she asked one cashier to help us. The books we found were for little children and not at all what she wanted, so we ended up buying a gift card for a bookstore instead.

The connections between the legacy of Bernays’ machinations and big box stores are quite obvious, although that’s not a lesson that seemed timely for a little girl turning 11 who loves the challenge of coloring and creating something beautiful.

My granddaughter’s portrait of her Ahma – July 8, 2017

Hopefully, there will be times in the future when we can laughingly recall our adventure and discuss the deeper implications. For the time being, she can enjoy an activity that doesn’t involve dangerous and addicting technology.

Ah how I wish I were as courageous as the woman who helped us. I can only imagine what her daughter thought, though. And I am left wondering what Bernays would think of the man hidden away to merely watch customers and do little to help them consume…

What an extraordinary teacher you are! I would have loved this post just learning about your approach in the classroom, but then, your experience looking for coloring books…oh, what a culture as we try to survive in it but not of it.

Diane, your kind words and friendship are always much appreciated. I’m not sure that I am a good teacher, but I do try try. And I can’t help but learn in the process and those apply lessons in the real world. 🙂

Thanks Carol, more people need to see this posting, where you are publicising Mr Adam Curtis. He has done a lot of things over many years and it’s mostly available on You Tube (still). It need careful watching. Maybe we can get a discussion group about these and other issues raised; Security as well, Where they’re watching the customers but at the same time ignoring their real needs- quite blatantly.
It necessary to educate adults about this world we’re living in now in 2018 before …

Such crucial insights about knowledge. Like all “tools,” it can be used to liberate or oppress. It’s crucial for all of to develop the skills to tell the difference, and your work inspires others to do so. ❤

> Carol A. Hand posted: “Carol A. Hand This morning, the odd synchronicity > of disparate experiences came to mind. “The simultaneous occurrence of > events which appear significantly related but have no discernible causal > connection,” played out recently in both a serious and amu” >

You are so blessed to have your granddaughter, Carol. If only I had a lovely, innocent someone to soothe my jaded, wretched soul, to keep me a little bit sane!

That mother was amazing. I would have given her a standing or sitting ovation, and then probably thrown something at the Nazi surveillance stooge. You should write a book, Carol: How to Get Waited on in Modern Day America

Yes, having grandchildren is a blessing. They continually remind me what’s important and why I need to do what I can. And the mother was amazing, and funny. So many people were laughing, except her 11-year-old daughter. I actually could read her embarrassment, (Or maybe I just was remembering how I felt when my father acted out in public places, although it was usually in anger.)

This reminds me, and I’ll try to make this short. Many years ago, I was living and working in a bookstore in Los Angeles, and I waited on Tim Conway.

His son was with him (11 or 12 years old), and every time Conway would make a joke, his son would roll his eyes and look frustrated. I was laughing at Conway, but I was also amused at his son’e exasperation with his father’s antics.

Carol, I learn so much from your posts. As an aging clinical social worker, I wish you had been my teacher all those years ago, but I am happy I can learn from you now.. Glad too, to learn how to get some assistance in understaffed stores. 🙂

Thank you so much for your lovely comments, Joan. I admire your ability to work as a clinician. It’s not something I could ever do. I can listen and empathize with people’s situations, (tearfully at times) but my first inclination is to try to change the systems that create problems in the first place. But I’m not sure I could follow the mother’s example as she challenged the system to do its job. 🙂

Awww, I’m sorry you and your granddaughter could not find a cool coloring book that day. It’s interesting that it wasn’t in a toy store for older kids — I wonder if they get sold in bookstores instead? or art stores? This sectioning of interests being carried by certain stores does make it harder to find things sometimes. (I didn’t know that it was Freud’s nephew who brought Freud’s understanding of the id to corporations. The ripple effect of one guy is amazing.)

Thank you so much for your thoughtful comments, MNL It is amazing to consider the influence one man had on the world. The effects are still with us today and have made it hard to us to sort out how we’ve been programmed to accept things as they are without questions.

On another note, we were able to find a coloring book my granddaughter liked in the bookstore we visited next.